I’ve been creating programmed art since 1995. Now, with NFT art and AI art, programmed art is very much in the spotlight, and this is very stimulating.
Since 1995, there were many adventures at the crossing of art and programs : the eu-gene mailing-list, transmediale festival in Berlin, the tools Director, shockwave, flash… Remember ? So many discussions, arguments, questions, manifestos.. It was exploration times, exciting and tough.
Other dinosaures of programmed art from the 90’s still create generative #NFTArt : @lia, @golan, @JoshuaDavis, @mariuswatz @memoakten @toxi @presstube @newrafael @reas @flight404, @joanie, and more… (?)
Some real pioneers of programmed art are Vera Molnar, Manfred Mohr, Frieder Nake**,** Georg Nees. This was in the 1960′, can you believe it ? But the first known generative art is Mozart dice game (1787).
For me, programming is a radically new material, in art and in life, because it is an active material. As opposed to painting, video, cinema, text, sculpture, it continues to change while being viewed, or even because it is viewed.
What do I call programmed art ? These are artworks where live programs are at the heart of the artwork, both during creation and during viewing of the artwork : systems, processes, generative, interactive.
I even wrote a Manifesto on programmed art, in 1998, for Turing’s sake https://www.antoineschmitt.com/3draftmanifesto/
In programmed art, the artwork is the process, as much or even more than its output. Some programmed artworks have no output. They just exist and as such, they trigger emotions, sensations and thoughts in the viewer.
The aesthetic feeling stems from sensations. The sensations generated by experiencing live processes and systems of programmed artworks are the same as time-based art, plus more, related to experiencing live performances.
Real time programmed artworks exist in the same present moment as the viewer, who feels the same emotions as in front of a performing artist : what will happen next ? What are the rules ? What are the risks ?
Identification, empathy, fear, expectation, surprise, analytical curiosity, awe, anxiety, laughter, joy, fascination, peacefulness, etc..
Some programmed artworks do not generate anything, they just exist. Some generate images, music, texts, .. In all cases, the artwork lies in the process, more than in the result. The repetitions and variations of outputs expose the process to the viewer.
When creating a programmed artwork, one manipulates the causes of the movements : systems, processes, mechanisms, forces, operations, energies, laws, rules, constraints, limits, actions, triggers, inhibitions, retroactions, links, influences,.. And The Randomness Goddess…
In programmed art, the creator manipulates the process at work, and the viewer is confronted, through the outputs, to the process. The process is the cause of the movement. I call this the aesthetics of the cause.
Using programmed artworks, I personally explore the processes of movement in : the cosmos, crowds, the psyche, physics, reasoning, the body, politics, dialectics, maths, social relations, economics, etc.. All these being dynamic fields of life, mind and spirits.
A computer is a universal machine in the sense of Turing, it can reproduce any process as long as this process can be fully described. Programmed artworks can thus reproduce any real life process, if it can be described. Which is a kind of magic.
With programmed artworks, one can simulate any real life process. Or invent new systems, new laws, new rules : dynamic fictions, parallel universes, alternate politics, imaginary ways of beings..
With programmed artworks, one can analyse or fictionalize the forces at stake in reality by reproducing them or altering them : physics, emotions, laws, traditions, chemistry, narratives, forces of life, etc..
The processes of life are very complex. Recreating them and tweaking them in programmed artworks sheds some light on what drives us : needs, desires, memory, predictions, curiosity, hormones, reason, etc.. and all combinations and conflicts thereof.
Recreating variations of real life processes in programmed artworks allows me to deconstruct the processes of reality, and reconstruct them partially or differently, thus shedding light on them or questioning them.
Heraclitus said that every shape is born from a conflict. Using programs, I create dynamic conflicts that create shapes : desire vs. reality, opposite desires, will vs. law, opposite forces, disrupting force, etc… Through the shapes, the viewer is confronted to the conflict.
Using programmed art, I ask the questions : why does it move ? Why does it move like this ? I recreate and abstract situations of real life or imaginary situations. They are delicate situations, unstable equilibriums, conflicts, etc..
Programmed art processes may act at surface image level (pixel), at movement level (physics), at structure level (architecture, rules), up to high symbolic levels (language and meaning), and any other dynamic level and mix of these.
(tweets posted in January 2022, in the heights of the NFT boom: musing attempts to articulate programmed art with art history and to explain my approach of programmed art. Slightly edited in January 2024 to remove Twitter’s specific writing formats and updating with AI art)
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